In the early 1980s, President Ronald Reagan was attacked and ridiculed when the U.S. Department of Agriculture classified ketchup as a vegetable in school lunches in an attempt to give school districts more flexibility in meeting federal nutrition standards. Now the USDA is allowing schools to offer Greek yogurt as a meat substitute.
Beginning the fall, schools across the country will be offering Greek yogurt, specifically Chobani brand Greek yogurt, as a meat substitute in school lunch guidelines, The Associated Press reports.
Chobani won the contract after a pilot program in four states found student happily consumed the yogurt during a three-month trail. At the launch of the program 200,000 pounds of the thicker, higher protein yogurt was consumed. That rose to 700,000 pounds by the end of the period.
The program came about at the request of Democratic New York Sen. Chuck Schumer in 2012. “With a stroke of a pen Secretary Vilsack could provide healthier foods for New York’s school children and an economic boost for yogurt makers and dairy farmers, two of the state’s most important industries,” Schumer wrote the USDA at the time.
Chobani is based in New York.
Tofu and soy yogurt have been USDA-approved meat substitutes since 2012. Other previously approved meat alternatives in school lunch programs include beans, nuts, peanut butter and sunflower seed butter.